Ideosity, a Chicago-based boutique web development company, has recently completed the implementation of a new Product Information Management System (PIM) for promotional product distributor, Crestline.

Crestline is a multi-channel direct marketing firm selling promotional products via direct mail and ecommerce. Crestline is owned by Geiger, the largest family-owned and most respected distributor in the promotional products industry worldwide.

Ideosity is a boutique web development company that specializes in building world-class websites for enterprise level customers with emphasis on Product Information Management (PIM) Systems. For many Ideosity customers, such as Crestline, this includes the implementation and integration of PIM into the overall website plan.

The project was launched to address the underlying problems that Crestline had with managing their product information. Crestline needed a better way to manage the complexity of promotional products in their website and catalogs while reusing the data in multiple channels.

Ideosity worked closely with Crestline to understand their business requirements and build a solution utilizing Informaticas PIM software. Ideosity, along with the team at Geiger, implemented all aspects of the PIM from start to finish including the print module for the automation of catalog production. This involved a complete understanding of Crestlines very complex data sets as well as a difficult integration with a legacy ERP system.

Crestline immediately began to see a return on their PIM investment in the first month it went into production. Previously, it took them several months to update their product pricing. This year on January 1, they were 100% current on top products and over 50% current for all products and will finish updates six months faster than last year, improving their margins and service to customers. The efficiency of the PIM is 300% greater than our previous spreadsheet process, said Dale Denham, Chief Information Officer at Geiger. But Im most excited about driving future growth by utilizing products on our other web properties.

Ideosity has become a trusted partner and an extension of our IT team. The entire team talks about Ideosity staff as if they were our staff. When we work with Ideosity, it is no different than a dedicated employee committed to meeting the company goal.